


The Little Death

by pallidiflora



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Andrastian Inquisitor, Drug Withdrawal, Hallucinations, Horror, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-20
Updated: 2015-01-20
Packaged: 2018-03-08 09:58:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3205061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pallidiflora/pseuds/pallidiflora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They are all gone, Cullen realizes. All except Maxwell, who stands now to the side, foiled in gold, sword in hand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Little Death

**Author's Note:**

  * For [forparadise](https://archiveofourown.org/users/forparadise/gifts).



> For Sarah. Merry Christmas, ya filthy animal.

Cullen has been waking in icy sweats of late. Sometimes he will scream, other times he'll gasp for air as though clawing his way out of a lake. _Claws_ , yes, that's what he dreams of. Lyrium under his fingernails, pushing rootlike out of his jaw. He tastes blood, his teeth feel loose in their sockets. He could check his mouth, in the small mirror he keeps beside his bed, but what would he find? His gums swollen, dark, pulpy, like tenderized meat. A gleam of red stone shunting his teeth aside, as in fairy stories about greed: _and so the king learned to be careful what he wished for, when one by one his teeth turned to jewels._

It's still dark in his room. He has been put up in one of the keep's drafty former bedrooms, only half-repaired—part of a wall has crumbled, there is lumber piled in a corner, the ceiling leaks when it rains. But his quarters suit him well enough, and he is not one to scorn small comforts. He has a rug, for instance, and a stock of candles, a trunk, and even bedclothes that are in good repair, though musty. A sturdy pillow is not something to thumb one's nose at.

He gets out of bed, shuffles to his washstand. There is a pitcher of tepid water on it, brackish if he were to taste it, which he splashes on his stubbly cheeks. His hands are shaking—often they have been shaking too badly to be trusted with tasks like shaving, though he continues to write his reports, writing with slow deliberation like a child. More than a few times the nib of his pen has torn through the parchment. It occurs to him that he has taken the use of his hands for granted; what a luxury it is, to be able to write things carelessly.

On this washstand is also a bottle of wine. A gift from the Inquisitor, brewed sometime in the Black Age, found on one of his excursions and surely expensive. He doesn't know why Maxwell gave him this bottle of wine; the Inquisitor's motivations are often muddy to him, but as he cannot argue with the end results he doesn't complain. In this case the end result was Maxwell shrugging, saying _I thought you might like it_. Not quite a lie—it is not out of character for him to be kind, and charitable, and thoughtful without cause—though also not the full truth.

But he will not comfort himself with drink, one bottle for another. He will not end up as so many other templars do—bereft, foreshortened, a diminished self. But he doesn't want to return to his bed, with its furs damp as the inside of a boot, to stew and fret. He will imagine things while lying there, possibly will even hallucinate: the dead coming to life, the walls bowing and warping, the floor growing a skin with hair and scabs. Red lyrium bursting from his own back, like jagged, monstrous wings, the color of blood.

* * *

They are playing cards in an alcove of the upper courtyard. It's a fine day, mid-Justinian and warm, though not many people are around. Probably they are working elsewhere; even in the courtyard there are signs of work needing to be done—flowerbeds lying unmulched and empty, huge stones in the middle of pathways needing to be broken up and hauled away. It is progressing nonetheless: they have placed benches, pruned bushes. They also have pulled a large, bronze statue of Andraste up from somewhere in the lower rooms and have installed her, ringed with candles, behind a closed door. Today Josephine has brought Antivan spirits which they drink from the bottle—though only a few sips for Maxwell—and Leliana is laying out cards in a formation she learned at court, explaining the rules as she goes along.

"So it's over when we draw the Angel of Death?" Blackwall is well in his cups already, and needs things explained to him several times.

"No, no, it's not like Wicked Grace," she says. "Orlesians don't see her as a bad omen the way you Fereldens do."

"Yeah, the Orlesians have plenty of their own bizarre, nonsensical bad omens," Varric says.

 _And their fair share of bizarre good omens._ The Chantry is to blame, with its statues of men chopping their own arms off, or headless, or with their entrails spilling out. Cullen has never been sure of their meaning: are they meant to be comforts, or warnings? _At least it isn't you_ or _this will be you, if you aren't careful?_ In fact the Chantry has latched onto so many symbols it has become tiresome: the sun, the colour white, blond hair and swords and anything else it can think of. It hoards them, it uses them as capital. Maxwell has had a few such ambiguous statues installed in the great hall, though not gory but with ascetic, solemn, resigned faces.

Cullen has had too much to drink. That's what he wishes to believe. He is a Ferelden, which in floral terms is something like a frost-tolerant plant: Fereldens are stout and hearty and red-cheeked and so on. But they—he—cannot tolerate Antivan wines and foods and spices, his blood is unsuited for them, they make his face hot, make sweat trickle between his shoulderblades. He badly wants to believe this, like a charm or prayer. _Say it and it shall be so._ He had that kind of power, once; power like a totem.

"It's your turn," Maxwell says from beside him.

He picks up a card. An angel. Stiff porcelain face, an expression of boredom or suffering, too-large eyes rolling back, hands clasped, blood on the mouth. The knight and angel cards all the look the same: filmy, pious and too pure. _Sanctimonious_. Like the statues they have a look of duplicity, of ambivalence: they too have the power to give or to take away, depending on their fancy.

He is reading too much into them. It is because he is too drunk. That also is why his cards feel malevolent, oppressive, too weighty to hold. His hands are shaking again, cold, divested of all bloodflow; his eyes slide in and out of focus. He can hear a faint voice— _like the Maker's own,_ that's what the Chantry says.

"Excuse me," he says.

He manages to walk straight-backed until out of sight, when he hunches, clutching his stomach. Everyone will think him churlish for leaving. He knows the sorts of things they say behind his back, or at least can imagine them: _tightarse. Prick. Speaking of, wouldn't know fun if it bit him on the end of it._ He makes it to the far end of the courtyard before falling to his knees and vomiting into an unfilled plot of soil. He vomits until his temples ache, though there isn't much that comes forth—he hasn't been eating much these days, sometimes managing only bread and water. _How saintly,_ he thinks.

There are footsteps approaching him. "Are you alright?" Maxwell's voice says. Speaking of saintly: the Herald of Andraste himself, always so kind, so devout, so _pure!_ Hands clasped, supplicating, eyes rolled upward. Too good for this world. It is the lyrium withdrawal that is making him savage, he knows this, but he wants to lash out, blindly, at anything.

"I'm fine," Cullen says, voice hoarse. He wipes his mouth on his sleeve, leaving a flecked, gleaming trail of saliva. "Leave me."

Maxwell places a hand on his shoulder, briefly, before turning away. Cullen's head has begun to clear. The voice was not a voice afterall but ringing in his ears. Is this what all the prophets heard? Take away their lyrium and they start thinking they're the next Andraste—tinnitus as revelation. He has only now noticed that what he thought was an empty flowerbed is really a tentative nursery. There are tender, pale-green shoots of dawn lotus, sparsely-planted, and prophet's laurel, and other things he can't identify. He has seen them placed as offerings at the feet of the Maker, though, in their full-grown, clipped-off state.

They are probably for healing potions, or tonics—something appreciably practical—but he cannot help but think of them lying inert at the feet of bronze, unfeeling Andraste. He can feel the statue's gaze on his back, even from behind its closed door.

* * *

He retires earlier than usual. It's well past sundown when he returns to his chamber, but there is yet a sense of guilt, of abandonment of duties. There are, for instance, still requisitions for weapon materials to be examined; requests for food from Griffon Wing Keep; new recruits arriving daily needing blankets and shoes and tins for boiling water. He cannot help but think of all the work involved, even if not his own: chipping metals from rock faces, hoeing vegetables. The very thought makes the corners of his eyes throb.

He had received a letter from his brother a few days prior, which before tonight he thought himself too busy to read. He sets out to read it now, but can't lie still for more than ten minutes, his back and legs aching. He paces, jiggles his feet, scratches his bare arms until there are long pinkish stripes which, if he isn't careful, will later bleed and scab; so he reads it in stages, beginning with the banal _Dear brother._ His brother never had a talent for letter-writing, it must run in the family.

 _The children are well,_ it goes on. _They ask after you often. One of the horses you were fond of had to be put down with a lame leg._ There is talk of the family orchards, in which there are plums, and apples, and currants. His nieces spend their time making daisy chains; his aging parents miss him. All in all a winsome guilt trip. _You could lead such a life, if you hadn't such pride:_ this is the implication. A rosy, idyllic life, round-edged, washed in milk and abundant with fruits and grains. A painting of the harvest one would see hung in a Chantry; a Ferelden he does not remember.

Reading this letter has left him limp and weak-limbed. He lies back on his bed, turns his gaze to the only window in his chamber, which is not glassed in and is scarcely more than an arrowslit. There is nothing he can see out of it, not at this angle, not at this time of night. Right now he cannot imagine writing his brother, holding a pen and moving it, squeezing words from himself like soapy water from a wrung-out cloth, blood from a stone. He cannot imagine interacting with his parents, or his nieces and nephews—they would want to practice swordfighting with him, or have him pick flowers, or climb on him and stick their fingers in his ears.

They would be sticky, smell of honey, hair, sun-bleached grass. He can see them now, arms reaching out, red to the elbow, sticky, yes, with blood. Holding their own heads, wreathed in daisy chains, like caught animals held in the hand, they used to catch toadspawn back at Honnleath, cupping them close and releasing them. Behind them South Reach is in flames, his parents emerge from it, blackened but with their white hair intact, lengthening, cocooning their bodies. His brother and sisters bubble and melt as though made of wax, everything but their eyes, like the milk-glass marbles they used to play with, white with brown or green stripes. The ones which Cullen had won, the first of military victories to come. Above all the furtive, mushroomy smell of lyrium, the taste of magic at the back of the throat.

They are all gone, Cullen realizes. All except Maxwell, who stands now to the side, foiled in gold, sword in hand.

* * *

He jolts awake to Maxwell's candlelit face floating in the darkness of his doorway. At first he does not recognize him—an angelic, anonymous blond head separated from its body, wreathed in fire. He had not realized he was sleeping.

"Where are they? Their heads?" he says, groping blindly about his bed. He's still dressed, lying atop his pristine bedclothes, his brother's letter still on his lap. "Dead, they're all dead—"

"Slow down. Who's dead?" Maxwell enters his room, places his candle on an overturned barrel. It's still dark, probably not past midnight, the air frigid. Despite this Cullen is overheated, breathless, his clothes sodden with wet heat; he thinks he must smell, the dense unwashed smell of a sick person.

"My..." He runs a hand over his damp face. There is moisture gathered in the creases beside his nose and mouth. "My family, I thought... I had a dream, or a hallucination, perhaps, I'm not sure..."

"Will you be alright?"

His entire body trembles. "Yes," he says. "It's so dark—there are candles in my trunk."

He's not thinking straight. If he were, he would want to be kept in darkness. He would not want to be seen too clearly in this watery, oversaturated state—softening, as though just beginning to rot. If he were thinking straight, he would ask Maxwell to leave, and would dunk his head in a barrel of water, strap on his armour and take a bracing walk. Sensible and no-nonsense, like a rap on the knuckles.

Ever dutiful, Maxwell digs out the candle stubs and lights them, placing them around the room: on his washstand, on a woodpile near his bed, on the floor. It gives the room a hushed, reverential feel, like an alcove for prayer. Without a word Maxwell takes the bottle of wine, uncorks it with a dagger kept on his belt and presents it to Cullen.

"Am I meant to take this like medicine?" he asks. The very thing he's feared. But he is not drinking alone. It is a show of camaraderie, no different than drinking in the courtyard this morning. He takes a long swig straight from the bottle—the wine is a red, powerfully tannic and drying to the tongue; it's from Orlais and has notes of blackcurrant, according to Maxwell, who knows more about these things by virtue of being more pedigreed. Cullen would think this image—worldly, epicurean almost—at odds with his usual straight-backed self, if he had not known so many pious, stinking-drunk nobles.

They drink the entire bottle. The sweat on Cullen's body has dried, leaving a tacky film; he is still too hot, though, definitely drunk this time. Maxwell also is more drunk than he has ever seen him, though he still has his usual pure, translucent, clear-eyed look. It is a look that Cullen is just now realizing is craftier than he had thought—benevolent, yes, but also calculating. But then one doesn't become the leader of an army through benevolence alone.

It is not surprising, then, when Maxwell leans in to kiss him, a hand on his knee. This, then, is the reason for the small tokens, and charity, and concern. Nonetheless he feels blindsided; he has not been with anyone for ten years or more, not since the Circle. The nudges and urgings of his body usually go ignored, save for the few times in the mornings when he will quickly stroke himself to completion, perfunctory as eating, thinking of nothing in particular.

He thinks about turning his head away. Saying _wait a moment. I don't—we can't—because I._ But he wants this. Maxwell kissing the scar above his lip, his jaw, his neck. He allows Maxwell to nudge apart his legs, to rub him into hardness and, finally, to take his cock into his mouth. Cullen groans, grinds the back of his head against his pillow. He shuts his eyes to block out his light-blue gaze; he will come too quickly, watching Maxwell watch him. Though he will come quickly anyway, it's been too long since he's had a mouth on him; already he can feel release building, in his stomach and the backs of his thighs, like an overeager youth in a barn or a copse of trees. He had trysts like that once, fifteen, twenty years ago.

Maxwell pulls away before he spends, stroking him through his orgasm, legs and hips jerking, mouth open but silent. He lies there for a moment, panting, eyes closed; he does not feel replete, but depleted. A release so violent it has left his head pounding, his stomach churning. They call it _la petite mort_ in Orlais, he has heard Leliana say so. _La tristesse._ He doesn't feel like he's in his own body, It must be the lyrium—control versus no control, or at least the illusion of it.

He props himself up on one elbow; Maxwell watches him, wipes the corners of his mouth with thumb and forefinger. "I've wanted this for so long," he says. The look he gives him is one of devotion, of satisfaction.


End file.
